Tacos and tearfulness

Just the other night as I was setting the table for dinner, I spontaneously combusted into tears in front of my two boys.  This spontaneous combustion happens fairy regularly these days but I try to keep it in check when they are around.  Little boys don't need to feel like they need to take care of their mother. Unfortunately, it seems to be not all that controllable right now. It is truly an unexpected explosion. Nonetheless, this was the first time I'd done it in front of them. If they've been there when it's happened in the past, I've managed to seek cover in the bathroom for long enough to hide any trace of weepiness. Not so this time.

It had been a very difficult day. The first day that my husband and I spent locked in a mediator's office trying to negotiate the terms of our marital dissolution, as the mediator politely and euphemistically likes to call it. We were arguing - maybe debating is a better word - about the terms of our impending divorce. How much alimony and child support should I be paying and for how long.  Needless to say I was saddened to be having these conversations, utterly confounded by the fact that I was sitting in a room with the man I married and had two children with and neither of us could look each other in the eye. And crushed under the weight of the probability that I will be financially on the hook for a very long time to come. At times I felt barely able to breathe from the pressure of knowing that there would never be a break for me, from the pressures of work, given the likely terms of our future arrangement.  Part of me wanted to jump into his lap and throw my arms around him and feel his scratchy face against my cheek again.  Smell his warm neck.  And part of me wanted to bang the table in frustration and fear and rage.

So I started crying while I put the tacos on the table. At first, my face contorted. Virgil said: mommy you're making a really weird face. Oh! You're crying.

"Yes, I am. I had a hard day.  I'm sorry. I shouldn't."

"It's ok, mom. You should cry if you're sad. You should let it out," Virgil empathized. Quite a kid.

"Are you sad that Aunt Rachel's dad died?" asked Wyatt.

"Well, sure, I'm sad for her. But I didn't know him very well. But I am very sad for Aunt Rachel. And I'm sad that Brain (our cat) died. And I miss daddy. And our family. And work is really hard right now. But I'll be ok. Let's have some tacos."

"It'll be ok, mom. And you can always tell us what's wrong. Really, it's ok."

And I felt better. And we ate tacos.